In general, a solid-state imaging element is configured such that color filters of three primary colors, red, green, and blue are arranged for each pixel in a Bayer array, for example. In addition, in the solid-state imaging element, the pixels receive light of respective colors split by the color filters to take an image of three primary colors.
Meanwhile, for example, there has been developed an imaging apparatus in which pixels receive split light of more colors than the three primary colors to take a plurality of images of respective colors (hereinafter, called multi-spectral images as appropriate).
For example, conventionally, the imaging apparatuses capable of taking multi-spectral images are configured such that a plurality of spectral filters is switched to take multi-spectral images, and stopping the spectral filters and taking an image with each switching between the individual spectral filters are repeated to take a set of multi-spectral images in a time-division manner.
As described above, the conventional imaging apparatuses are configured to repeat switching and stopping the spectral filters, which makes it hard to take a set of multi-spectral images in a short time (for example, about one second). Therefore, when a long time takes to take a set of multi-spectral images (for example, about several seconds), moving objects such as tree branches swinging in the wind, for example, may not align with each other between the set of multi-spectral images. A composite of the multi-spectral images will appear blurred.
In contrast to this, Patent Document 1 discloses an imaging apparatus that takes a set of multi-spectral images in a time-division manner without stoppage of individual spectral filters so that the multi-spectral images can be taken at high speeds. In this imaging apparatus, markings of boundaries between the spectral filters are detected from the taken images and the image data is allocated.